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Kitchen Range/Oven Recommendation Needed

My wife and I are the very proud owners 1990 Jamestowner HB. We bought it two weeks ago and have loved every minute we have spent on it. The issue we have is that my wife loves to cook and the boat currently has a Magic Chef propane range/oven that does not suit her needs. We would like to upgrade the stove and convert to electric. I don't really know where to start. Please help inform us so we can make a good decision.

I've had both electric and lp,i just like the lp a lot better and I think its easier to cook with (yes I cook)if you go with gas you can get a lp conversion kit wherever you buy the stove,most will just give it to you.

I, too, am in the market for a galley stove. Unlike the original poster, I wouldn't have an electric stove if it were free. Spent half my young married life waiting for a dang burner to heat up, and the other half looking for a place to put a hot pot while the burner cooled off. Arrggggh! Hated 'em. And there is the generator problem... We built this shanty boat to get away from noise and inconvenience! Chacun a son gout, as they say. Problem is, real marine ranges are super spendy. 1.5K for a dollhouse-sized stove? Plus shipping and installation? Yikes! And the used ones I have seen look to have been replaced for good reason. Not tempted. RV stoves, not stainless, and without the safety gas cutoff are somewhat cheaper, but to tell you the truth, I am tempted to just trundle the gas grill from the back deck to the houseboat stern deck before we go somewhere that might require cooking. We shall see if I can remember how to make camp coffee.

What no-one has asked or said yet is how does Dr Jack use his generator. Is this a big boat and the generator runs from the time you board the boat till the time you leave it? If so then go with electric. However if the generator is an intermittent thing, starting it up at 0600 for coffee might make you very unpopular. And what do you do if the genny quits?

However there are alternatives. A portable canister stove works for stove-top coffee, and a small coffeemaker can run on an inverter.

I've been through the "This isn't what I want, change it!!!" routine. But boats (even houseboats) are NOT houses nor apartments and compromises have to be made.

Might be good to live with what you have for the rest of the season at least.

If it is like the propane stove on my previous Jametowner, it is going to be hard to find an electric unit to fit in its space - not to mention wiring for an electric unit. What about the unit does your wife not like?

My boat is docked most of the time where it has an electric hook up that is metered. I also have an inverter that runs lights and so forth on a short run. The generator is kicked one if we want to run the AC or stay over night.

she does not like that it does not work. I am interested in how to convert to Electric.

Is repairing the stove that "doesn't work" an option? Is replacing it with a shiny new LP one that fits the hookups that are already there an option? Rewiring and refitting to accommodate the power required by an electric stove sounds complicated and expensive! On the other hand, if you're just real fans of electric stoves, and money is no object, I suspect there's some ambitious electrician out there will be delighted to go to the trouble in your behalf. It might take a fair amount of fiddling with the boats innards and render your galley off-limits for a surprisingly long time, if my land-based appliance replacement was anything to go by-- a new refrigerator ended up requiring a whole new kitchen.